Women’s Role in Constitution Building

Subject : Polity

Section: Constitution

Concept :

The riveting work by Achyut Chetan,” The Founding Mothers of the Republic” published by Cambridge University Press in 2022 serves as a means of rectifying this historical omission and giving due credit to the women who played a crucial role in shaping India’s democracy.

Women In constitutional Assembly

When the Constitution was completed, there were 11 women members of the Constituent Assembly who signed onto it.
These drafters were G Durgabai, Ammu Swaminathan, Amrit Kaur, Dakshayani Velayudhan, Hansa Mehta, Renuka Ray, Sucheta Kripalani, Purnima Banerjee, Begum Qudsiya Aizaz Rasul, Kamala Chaudhri and Annie Mascarene.
The Constituent Assembly first met on December 11, 1946 and had 169 sessions before all its members signed the document on January 24, 1950.

Role of Women in the constituent assembly

Hansa Mehta and Amrit kaur: Hansa Mehta and Amrit Kaur were on the Advisory Committee, with both being members of the Fundamental Rights Sub Committee and Kaur serving also on the Minorities Sub-Committee.
G Durgabai: G Durgabai occupied effective positions on two important committees on procedural affairs The Steering Committee and the Rules Committee.
Women were highly active: Women members were present and highly active on almost all significant committees and subcommittees.
Women members often faced disrespect and discrimination: For instance, Renuka Ray opposed the clause on the Right to Property which put the compensation given within the purview of courts. During the debates on the floor of the Assembly too she was constantly interrupted and heckled even by the men of the eminence and tried to deride their amendments
Women members made their opinions known and stood firm: In the settings of the committees they wrote notes of dissent, Amrit Kaur and Hansa Mehta wrote notes of dissent against decisions that relegated the uniform civil code to the non-justiciable rights, allowed the state to impose conscription for compulsory military service, at each stage when the committees made their official recommendations to the higher bodies of the Assembly

Views of Dakshayani Velayudhan on reservation

Dakshayani Velayudhan, the only woman member from the Scheduled Castes communities, argued against reservations.
She refused by saying “to believe that 70 million Harijans are to be considered as a minority and argued that reservations would not be in the best interests of them.
She also argued that “the working of the Constitution will depend upon how the people will conduct themselves in the future, not on the actual execution of the law. When this Constitution is put into practice, what we want is not to punish the people for acting against the law, but for the state to take on the task of educating citizens for a transformation.”